India car sales dip 15.8% in July

The rising interest rates, hike in the fuel prices and the Maruti Suzuki India’s 13-day employee strike in the month of June have played their own part in contributing to the massive plunge registering 15.8% in cars sales in India in the month of July, this year. This is marked as the lowest dip in cars sales in India in the past 30 months with only 1, 33,747 units sales against 1,58,767 unit sales during the same period last year as informed by SIAM (Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers) yesterday. The SIAM director, Mr. Vishnu Mathur had informed the media that this is first time since January 2009 that the car sales have suffered to this extent spreading the negative sentiment in the domestic market. The car sales have apparently hit by 3.2 % year-by-year since January 2009 accumulating to 19.3%, the lowest since November 2008.

Maruti Suzuki India, the ace player in the hatchback manufacturing had also been a contributing factor leading to the agonizing sales on two grounds, one due to their dedicated involvement in upcoming new Maruti Swift launch due on 17th of August, this year along with its Maruti Swift Dzire makeover being the other, that had impacted the production in Maruti Suzuki India, knocking down the sales as much as 17, 000 units. Mr Mathur of SIAM has emphasized on the point that this distressing sales figures are not due to the lack of demand, but has resulted, because of the failure in meeting the demand with the supply.